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193 lines
7.5 KiB
ReStructuredText
193 lines
7.5 KiB
ReStructuredText
******************
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What is Reticulum?
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******************
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Reticulum is a cryptography-based networking stack for building both local and
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wide-area networks with readily available hardware, that can continue to operate
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under adverse conditions, such as extremely low bandwidth and very high latency.
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Reticulum allows you to build wide-area networks with off-the-shelf tools, and
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offers end-to-end encryption, forward secrecy, autoconfiguring cryptographically
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backed multi-hop transport, efficient addressing, unforgeable packet
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acknowledgements and more.
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From a users perspective, Reticulum allows the creation of applications that
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respect and empower the autonomy and sovereignty of communities and individuals.
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Reticulum enables secure digital communication that cannot be subjected to
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outside control, manipulation or censorship.
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Reticulum enables the construction of both small and potentially planetary-scale
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networks, without any need for hierarchical or bureaucratic structures to control
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or manage them, while ensuring individuals and communities full sovereignty
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over their own network segments.
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Reticulum is a **complete networking stack**, and does not need IP or higher
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layers, although it is easy to utilise IP (with TCP or UDP) as the underlying
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carrier for Reticulum. It is therefore trivial to tunnel Reticulum over the
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Internet or private IP networks. Reticulum is built directly on cryptographic
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principles, allowing resilience and stable functionality in open and trustless
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networks.
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No kernel modules or drivers are required. Reticulum can run completely in
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userland, and will run on practically any system that runs Python 3. Reticulum
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runs well even on small single-board computers like the Pi Zero.
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Current Status
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==============
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**Please know!** Reticulum should currently be considered beta software. All core protocol
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features are implemented and functioning, but additions will probably occur as
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real-world use is explored. *There will be bugs*. The API and wire-format can be
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considered complete and stable at the moment, but could change if absolutely warranted.
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What does Reticulum Offer?
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==========================
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* Coordination-less globally unique addressing and identification
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* Fully self-configuring multi-hop routing over heterogeneous carriers
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* Flexible scalability over heterogeneous topologies
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* Reticulum can carry data over any mixture of physical mediums and topologies
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* Low-bandwidth networks can co-exist and interoperate with large, high-bandwidth networks
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* Initiator anonymity, communicate without revealing your identity
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* Reticulum does not include source addresses on any packets
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* Asymmetric X25519 encryption and Ed25519 signatures as a basis for all communication
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* The foundational Reticulum Identity Keys are 512-bit Elliptic Curve keysets
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* Forward Secrecy is available for all communication types, both for single packets and over links
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* Reticulum uses the following format for encrypted tokens:
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* Ephemeral per-packet and link keys and derived from an ECDH key exchange on Curve25519
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* AES-128 in CBC mode with PKCS7 padding
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* HMAC using SHA256 for authentication
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* IVs are generated through os.urandom()
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* Unforgeable packet delivery confirmations
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* Flexible and extensible interface system
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* Reticulum includes a large variety of built-in interface types
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* Ability to load and utilise custom user- or community-supplied interface types
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* Easily create your own custom interfaces for communicating over anything
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* Authentication and virtual network segmentation on all supported interface types
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* An intuitive and easy-to-use API
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* Simpler and easier to use than sockets APIs and simpler, but more powerful
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* Makes building distributed and decentralised applications much simpler
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* Reliable and efficient transfer of arbitrary amounts of data
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* Reticulum can handle a few bytes of data or files of many gigabytes
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* Sequencing, compression, transfer coordination and checksumming are automatic
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* The API is very easy to use, and provides transfer progress
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* Lightweight, flexible and expandable Request/Response mechanism
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* Efficient link establishment
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* Total cost of setting up an encrypted and verified link is only 3 packets, totalling 297 bytes
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* Low cost of keeping links open at only 0.44 bits per second
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* Reliable sequential delivery with Channel and Buffer mechanisms
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Where can Reticulum be Used?
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============================
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Over practically any medium that can support at least a half-duplex channel
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with greater throughput than 5 bits per second, and an MTU of 500 bytes. Data radios,
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modems, LoRa radios, serial lines, AX.25 TNCs, amateur radio digital modes,
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ad-hoc WiFi, free-space optical links and similar systems are all examples
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of the types of interfaces Reticulum was designed for.
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An open-source LoRa-based interface called `RNode <https://unsigned.io/rnode>`_
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has been designed as an example transceiver that is very suitable for
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Reticulum. It is possible to build it yourself, to transform a common LoRa
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development board into one, or it can be purchased as a complete transceiver
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from various vendors.
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Reticulum can also be encapsulated over existing IP networks, so there's
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nothing stopping you from using it over wired Ethernet or your local WiFi
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network, where it'll work just as well. In fact, one of the strengths of
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Reticulum is how easily it allows you to connect different mediums into a
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self-configuring, resilient and encrypted mesh.
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As an example, it's possible to set up a Raspberry Pi connected to both a
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LoRa radio, a packet radio TNC and a WiFi network. Once the interfaces are
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added, Reticulum will take care of the rest, and any device on the WiFi
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network can communicate with nodes on the LoRa and packet radio sides of the
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network, and vice versa.
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Interface Types and Devices
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===========================
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Reticulum implements a range of generalised interface types that covers the communications hardware that Reticulum can run over. If your hardware is not supported, it's simple to :ref:`implement an interface class<example-custominterface>`. Currently, Reticulum can use the following devices and communication mediums:
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* Any Ethernet device
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* WiFi devices
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* Wired Ethernet devices
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* Fibre-optic transceivers
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* Data radios with Ethernet ports
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* LoRa using `RNode <https://unsigned.io/rnode>`_
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* Can be installed on `many popular LoRa boards <https://github.com/markqvist/rnodeconfigutil#supported-devices>`_
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* Can be purchased as a `ready to use transceiver <https://unsigned.io/rnode>`_
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* Packet Radio TNCs, such as `OpenModem <https://unsigned.io/openmodem>`_
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* Any packet radio TNC in KISS mode
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* Ideal for VHF and UHF radio
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* Any device with a serial port
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* The I2P network
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* TCP over IP networks
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* UDP over IP networks
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* Anything you can connect via stdio
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* Reticulum can use external programs and pipes as interfaces
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* This can be used to easily hack in virtual interfaces
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* Or to quickly create interfaces with custom hardware
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For a full list and more details, see the :ref:`Supported Interfaces<interfaces-main>` chapter.
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Caveat Emptor
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==============
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Reticulum is an experimental networking stack, and should be considered as
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such. While it has been built with cryptography best-practices very foremost in
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mind, it has not yet been externally security audited, and there could very well be
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privacy-breaking bugs. To be considered secure, Reticulum needs a thorough
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security review by independent cryptographers and security researchers. If you
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want to help out with this, or can help sponsor an audit, please do get in touch.
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